


Sensing Beyond

by The_Duchess



Category: The Tomorrow People (2013), The Tomorrow People - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Discovery, F/M, Falling In Love, Fate
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-21
Updated: 2014-02-23
Packaged: 2018-01-09 12:17:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1145891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Duchess/pseuds/The_Duchess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cara finds Stephen when they need him the most. Maybe she needs him, too. Stephen's struggling to understand himself - Cara might have (or be) the answer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The first time that Cara laid eyes on Stephen, only one word came to mind: kismet. She knew, from finding him and later contacting him using her powers, that he was a not only one of them, but powerful. She understood what power felt like. After being abandoned by her natural family, she, John and the others formed an all-encompassing family full of mutual love and respect for their kind. She found that the younger women looked up to her as a figure for maturity and strength, just as the men did to John. Although they lived in the shadows, Cara knew that one day all of humanity would accept their kind as an asset and not as mutated beings. A bridge was needed for this goal to be accomplished. She was determined to find it. After an arduous year of searching, she tracked down Stephen and knew, in an instant, that he could be the answer.

“John, I found him! He’s in the city. A little unstable right now, but I know he’ll be receptive if I reach out.”

“Cara, be careful. You don’t want to scare him off. I know you can be intimidating at first. Just try to approach him telepathically at first. It’ll be easier to adjust to for him.”

“What’s that supposed to mean – you think he’ll run screaming if I appear before him and state who we are, what we do, and more importantly, what his uncle does for a living?”

“Of course he should know, I’m just saying, be gentle about your strategy to get him on our side. You remember what happened with the last person we found.”

“It’s not my job to regulate teenage hormones, John.” The latest of their kind that had been brought underground was initially contacted by John. Thinking he was going crazy, he asked the “voice” in his head to prove itself to be true. He asked for a female voice, which Cara provided, and later, a physical being to go along with the voice. When Cara showed up in all leather, the poor teenager was so beside himself that he fainted. Apparently, the sound and sight of her together was too much to handle. She quickly teleported them to the underground and had John deal with him. He showed great promise in the field of physics, so he spent most of his time in the lab. He couldn’t walk by Cara without blushing.

“I get it, John, you don’t have to worry. I’m going topside to initiate contact. I believe this will be a first for him.”

“Be safe. I think I’ll work on hand-to-hand combat with some of the young ones.”

“Have fun – see you.” With that, Cara was gone in a flash. After sensing Stephen, she decided the park would be the easiest place to contact him without being directly seen. Luckily, he cut through it on his way from school. Midway through his trek, she started a conversation.

“Stephen, can you hear me? This isn’t a dream. Sit down on that bench.”

Stephen looked confused. Aloud, he said “Who’s there?” 

“My name’s Cara. I know you’ve been experiencing some interesting lately, like waking up in strange places and moving things around. This is all normal for someone like you.”

“Someone like me? How do you know who I am?”

“Don’t you feel awkward speaking aloud to no one? Just talk to me telepathically, like I’m talking to you right now.”

“Can you see me?” Stephen looked around but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. He searched the park with his eyes, then closed them and felt it – her. She was southwest of him, about 200 feet, in a tree. 

“Why are you in tree? I’d like to see you, if that’s allowed. It’s weird to have someone in my head and not put a face to a name. Please, I won’t freak out.”

“Go towards that drinking fountain and take a left, behind the statue of the old mayor. I’ll meet you there.” Cara wasn’t nervous. No, her palms were simply sweaty because of the humidity in the air. Surely, after all she’d encountered, presenting herself to Stephen would be a piece of cake.

Stephen followed Cara’s directive and stood, hands in his pockets, trying to be brave. He had no idea what was in store for him and truthfully, was nervous about meeting the voice. What if she was old, or wanted to take him away from his family? What if this was a dream? 

“It’s not a dream, Stephen. I’m about as real as it gets.”

He turned around and was promptly flabbergasted. There were no other words for how he was feeling. “I’m – you’re – wait, I, what?” Standing in front of him was one of the most striking females he’d seen yet in his life and that including the ones from magazines. She had eyes like the sea, blue and mysterious, holding in secrets he failed to comprehend. The rest of her was gorgeous: lithe, athletic body covered in the right amount of leather and cashmere, cheekbones that would fit his hands perfectly, lips made for kissing…

“You know I can hear what you’re thinking, right? You have nice cheekbones, too.”

Stephen turned red faster than the time his mom caught him jacking off in the shower when he was 14. He should have locked the door but upon waking up from a wet dream with 20 minutes until the school bus, he needed relief. Unfortunately, his mother needed to get a move on for work and burst into the bathroom, groaning about the early hour. She gasped seeing Stephen in such a state and immediately backtracked, yelling for him to “finish up in there, Mom’s got real work to take care of today”, leaving him embarrassed enough to barely finish.

He did have nice cheekbones, upon reflection (and nice other assets), although she would try in the future to disregard such thoughts. She needed him for the power and skill he could provide, not for how he looked.

“Can we,” Stephen tried to form words again. “Is there somewhere we can go to talk, privately?”

“Do you trust me? I can take us somewhere safe.”

“Yes,” Stephen replied, pulse racing.

“Take my hand and we can go.”

The spark he felt was undeniable. She felt it too but refused to acknowledge the gravity of it. No one fell in lust in 5 minutes. At least, not Cara.

Boys and their hormones, she thought to herself.

“Hey!” Stephen protested.

She teleported them off to the underground, a slight smile on her face.


	2. Chapter 2

Stephen was awestruck by this entire situation. It was strange to behold someone having the same, well, powers as him. At first, he thought he was freaking out. He started noticing little things about people, like when someone said something sarcastic and immediately said something in their own head completely different. Stephen could hear it, a couple of times even responded to those statements instead, which thoroughly confused people. Then there was the embarrassing occasions of waking up in other people’s beds. At night, he locked himself in his room only to wake up sandwiched in between an old couple, in his boxers, no less. It was happening so frequently that he tied himself up, to no avail. Lately, he’d been testing out moving things with his mind, just within the safety of his room behind closed doors. It was incredible and frightening to see his room clean “itself”. He tried to look it up online but the internet couldn’t answer any of his questions. He was about to come clean to his mom that night and then Cara found him in in the park.

“Where are we going? I need to be home sometime tonight.”

“Don’t worry,” said Cara. “I’ll make sure you’re home before curfew, although you might miss dinner. Just stick by me on the train, okay?”

“Train? Where are you taking me?” Stephen was officially worried. Cara chanced a look at him. His body was trembling slightly, either out of nervousness or fear. 

“Calm down, Stephen. You’re going to be fine – the place I’m taking you can only be reached by train.”

Stephen sighed and decided since Cara hadn’t killed him, he was probably safe.

“Yes, Stephen, you’re safe.” This was said telepathically with a raised eyebrow from Cara.  
Upon reaching their train, Cara led them to the back car and, after making sure no one was there, held Stephen’s hand. 

“Ready? It’s going to feel like a shiver when we transport. Nothing serious.”

Stephen braced himself and closed his eyes. 3 seconds went by and he landed on a set of stairs. 

“Welcome to the Underground. Try not to stare. I’ll show you around later - we need to meet some people first.”

Stephen’s reaction to this supposed Underground was comical, Cara decided. His mouth was hanging open and his brain was clearly on sensory overload with all the others communicating on the same frequency as him. He put his hands up to his ears to try to block it out. Cara laughed out loud and Stephen shot her a dirty look, clearly frustrated with the circumstances.

“That’s a trick I can teach you, blocking out the volume of the communication of us down here – no worries. We’re going to meet 2 important people now. Are you ready?

“Yeah, I guess so.” Cara led him to the back offices and took a deep breath. She hoped John wouldn’t be argumentative about Stephen but he absolutely hated new people. Maybe this would be different.

“Stephen, meet John, a big part of our leadership here. This is Russell, another leader down here.” Stephen shook hands with both guys before sitting down in the nearest chair.

“Glad you could join us Stephen. You get here in once piece?” John looked amused and horrified at the arrival of Stephen.

“Yeah, Cara brought me here just fine. She found me in the park – I’m glad otherwise maybe I’d be at the doctor’s office right now being juiced up with some drug that could hide my powers. Is that what they are? Who are we, really? Why is this happening?”

“John can field this one – he’s our local historian,” Russell joked. 

“We call ourselves Tomorrow People,” said John. “A mutation happened along the way, not unlike what people read about in the X-men comics, and here we are. We mainly have 3 sets of power – telekinesis, telepathy and teleportation. There’s a rumor that another power could occur in certain individuals, but I haven’t seen it yet. You are here because Cara felt the need to introduce you to our world before you were found out by the wrong people.”

“What people? Doctors, the police, Interpol?”

“No, Stephen, by Ultra.”

Stephen put his head in his hands. This was a lot to take in, given he’d just assumed he was going crazy. Apparently, that wasn’t the case. Why would Ultra be interested in him? He knew that Ultra was he uncle’s company. It conducted research and high-level analysis for some government agencies, but that was all he knew.

“Why would they want me? I’m just a teenager.”

“A special teenager!” exclaimed Russell. “You aren’t like everyone else. If they knew, they’d take you away from your family and put you under some rigorous training to hunt out people like you. You probably don’t want to do that so aren’t you lucky we found you first?”

Stephen looked at Cara for confirmation. “Is this for real?”

“Yes, Stephen it’s for real. There aren’t secrets down here, so don’t feel the need to talk only to Cara,” said John with a steely glance. “Whatever you are thinking, we can hear. What you’re feeling – it can be sensed. I know this feels like we’re turning your life upside down, but that’s not the case. We want to help you and for you to help us.”

“How can I help?”

“That’s for Cara to explain. Russell and I have work to do. In the meantime, think about what we said and what it means for you and your family. Also, I can’t believe I’m saying this, but don’t tell anyone about this. The Underground is only for people like us.”

“Okay…I won’t tell anyone. Cara, what’s next? How can I help?”

“Come with me. We’ll need to test out your development thus far.” Cara led Stephen to a practice area surrounded by metal and strange objects. 

“Take off your sweatshirt – we’re going to get physical. I’m planning to push you to your limits to see how far you can go.” With that, Cara removed her jacket and sweater and revealed a blue tank top underneath.

“Stephen, stop staring and let’s go.” Cara’s words were in Stephen’s head, closer to a demand than a request. He shrugged off his sweatshirt and rolled his shoulders.

“Alright, I’m ready. Show me what you’ve got.”

Cara grinned an evil smiled and launched herself at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Terribly sorry for the delay - will try to post once a week!

**Author's Note:**

> My first work in this fandom - this will be at least 10 chapters. Happy reading!


End file.
